a Mountain in the hland of Owhyhee, 203 



We again embarked, in the cool of the evening, with our 

 conductor, in one of the king's large double canoes, and pro- 

 ceeded on to the northward till we reached Tai-ta-tooa Bay, in 

 the bottom of which we landed at the village of Hanua-oora, 

 under the noisy acclamations of a numerous group of men, 

 women, and children, who expressed their joy by singing, 

 dancing, and capering before us in such a frantic manner, that 

 it was with great difficulty the chief could clear an avenue 

 through them. He conducted us to a large house belonging 

 to the king, which we were happy to find was within a tabooed 

 space, so that we soon got clear of their teasing curiosity, and 

 enjoyed our evening's repast and night's repose in quietness ; 

 but the chief himself was up most part of the night, preparing 

 for our journey inland, which was to commence from this 

 place; and, as it was likely we should be some days in the 

 mountains, it was necessary to provide provisions of every 

 kind, with a quantity of cloth and mats for our bedding at 

 night, and men to carry the whole; so that the collecting 

 and arranging of these matters was a weighty concern on 

 Harou's mind. 



As it was my intention to ascertain the height of the moun- 

 tain we were going to ascend, I brought with me a kind of 

 portable barometer, for which I was entirely indebted to the 

 liberality of the late Colonel Gordon, at the Cape of Good 

 Hope. That gentleman, when he understood that we had no 

 portable barometer on board for ascertaining the height of any 

 mountain that might be ascended during the voyage, presented 

 me, in the most generous manner, with his own, which he had 

 long been in the habit of using in the interior parts of Africa, 

 and which had accompanied him in his interesting journeys 

 through that country for many hundred leagues. The simplicity 

 of its contrivance, and the ease with which it is carried and 

 managed, may probably render it preferable, on such occa- 

 sions, to a more expensive instrument, which, in ascending 

 pathless rugged mountains, is so liable to be broken. I shall, 

 therefore, subjoin a short description of it, and the manner of 

 using it, leaving the reader to judge of the probable degree of 

 accuracy of the observations made with it at different- heights, 

 both in this and in my subsequent journey to the summit of 

 Mowna-roa. 



It consists of a straight glass tube, about 3 ft. long, filled 

 with mercury, which was doubly secured by a small stopper, 

 and a piece of soft leather tied over the end of it; this tube, 

 together with a brass scale of about the same length, divided 

 and subdivided into inches and tenths, was placed in a small 

 wooden case, lined with cloth, where the scale was made fast, 



r 2 



